Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 16, 1993 TAG: 9302160066
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
LEGAL ATTACKS ON DRUNKEN DRIVING GETTING STRONGER
Lawmakers in many states, including Virginia, are pondering social arithmetic in the latest round of legislative assaults on an old menace, the drunken driver.Bills introduced this year in at least 33 states reflect a push for more deterrents and stricter punishment for intoxicated drivers.
The most common proposal is lowering the intoxication level from 0.10 percent blood-alcohol to 0.08 percent - about a one-drink difference. Another popular cause is tighter penalties on young drivers.
"It's reached a point where most of the states have sanctions they consider reasonable and effective," said Jeanne Mejeur, a policy analyst at the National Conference of State Legislatures in Denver.
"They're saying `We've done what we can without impinging on people's rights. Now what can we do to get the problem drinker off the road?' " she said.
State criminal codes are filled with fairly new anti-drunken-driving laws, enacted at a clip of about 150 a year between 1982 and 1990.
The years of new legislation, combined with education programs, have changed attitudes and driving behavior to help cut the carnage blamed on alcohol.
In 1982, alcohol accounted for 57.2 percent of the 43,945 traffic fatalities. Last year, drinking played a part in 46 percent of the 39,500 road deaths, according to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates.
The standard for legal intoxication in 45 states, 0.10 blood-alcohol, translates for a 160-pound man into five drinks within an hour on an empty stomach.
More than a dozen states may lower the legal definition of drunkenness - Pennsylvania from 0.10 blood-alcohol to 0.07, and 13 others from 0.10 to 0.08. Among the five states already set at 0.08 is Oregon, where a bill proposes lowering it to 0.04.
In Virginia, a bill to lower the limit from 0.10 to 0.08 has been passed by the House of Delegates and awaits action in a Senate committee. At or above the limit, a driver charged with drunken driving is presumed to be impaired. A defendant who tested above the limit can escape conviction by proving otherwise, such as by passing a field sobriety test.
While body size, metabolism and alcohol tolerance make it misleading to say how many drinks produce a 0.08 blood-alcohol level, research shows that level impairs anyone's judgment and reflexes, said Jim Fell, a science advisor at the federal highway safety agency in Washington.
Taking another tack, bills in six states target drinking drivers under 21, threatening yearlong license suspension and community service if their blood-alcohol is 0.02 - which results from about one drink - or, in Indiana, 0.01.
So who would argue with curbing drunken drivers?
Some believe enough already has been done to combat highway intoxication. South Dakota already heard a few this session - a bill to require drunken drivers to perform community service died under the weight of complaints it would burden the bureaucracy. And a bill to lower the blood-alcohol limit to 0.08 was thrown out for being unfair to responsible drinkers.
Mothers Against Drunk Driving, which led the grass-roots war that inspired the first round of new legislation, isn't satisfied.
"This is the most solvable crime," said Milo Kirk, national president of Irving, Texas-based MADD. "Legislators can't become complacent."
Some information for this story came from staff reports.